@jcs@jcs.org
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

jcs

@jcs@jcs.org

Hello, cyberpals. I make Pushover and old Macintosh stuff for you and me.

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jcs, to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

Ok friends, making 60 PowerBook 1xx batteries was fun but I think I'm done now

These are the last 8 that will be for sale

https://www.tindie.com/products/jcs/powerbook-1xx-battery/

jcs, to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

I haven't been able to sell my new PowerBook 1xx batteries internationally because nobody seems to want to deal with them on airplanes, even though I label the box and customs form that it isn't a lithium ion battery (it's nickel-metal hydride). I tried through USPS and they refused it at the border and sent it back.

Someone recently bought two on eBay through their International Shipping program where I only list them as shipping domestically and eBay has me ship to a local forwarder but they deal with repackaging it and shipping it internationally. Apparently they also failed because they just canceled this order but somehow I don't have to refund the buyer and eBay pays for it. I guess I don't get my batteries back though?

jcs, to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

I bought a clothes steamer on Amazon twelve years ago and have only used it a few times since then, but I just got an e-mail that it was recalled for a safety issue. The US manufacturer instructed me to sever its electrical cord and upload a photo showing its serial number so they can send me a new model.

I only mention this because 12 years on, I imagine if I went on Amazon today to buy one, there would be hundreds of steamers that all look like they were made from the same plastic mold but are sold from different Chinese companies with terrible randomly-generated names. I'd probably just pick whichever one had the best reviews for the price and not really think about the company disappearing a year later (or generating another random company name), much less still be around 12 years later to do a safety recall.

jcs, (edited ) to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

Well it took 41 years but I finally own my first 5 ¼" floppy disk

I kept seeing this disk for sale on eBay and wanted to know what was actually on it, so I bought an Epson floppy drive and was able to connect it to my Applesauce to image it

The raw FAT12 disk image is on IA: https://archive.org/details/bbsc83

It appears to be a "BBS (Bulletin Board System) written in UNIX SYSTEM-III "C"" written by Mike Kelly, last edited 07/07/1983

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@tj I haven't tried yet

jcs, to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

How many of you are also on BlueSky?

Mastodon still has the discoverability problem where I can't see random posts I might like because I'm on my own server and can only find new people to follow when someone I already follow forwards something I find interesting enough to investigate (which then leads to the other problem where I can't see a random person's old posts in my client without having to view their profile on their own server).

I don't really want to run my own server and keep it up to date, but I can't join someone else's server with my own identity (I tried living on SDF's servers and they kept forgetting to renew their TLS cert). I wrote my own ActivityPub server but it was too hard keeping up with the private "Mastodon API" that every mobile app uses, so I gave up and switched to the official Mastodon server software which is huge and constantly changing (and breaking).

I hate that Twitter died and fragmented everything.

jcs, (edited ) to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

Upgraded the Braun clock in my office to a slightly different one

jcs, to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

🙃

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@wezm Programming on the machine itself, being able to communicate with the internet, moving files around my network, writing things

paulrickards, to random
@paulrickards@mastodon.social avatar

Currently listening to this Sonic Sunset show from 20060901 on 89.3FM WNUR featuring artists from the B12 record label (early 90s electronic) and it's perfect to code to.

https://archive.org/details/RamzGT_Sonic_Sunset_Archive/ci_20060901_b12.mp3

(no. 67 on that page)

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@paulrickards I still listen to old Sonic Sunset shows almost every day!

The Israel Vines mix is probably my most played

jcs, (edited ) to random
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jcs, (edited ) to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

If you've ever gotten this annoying error when trying to restart or shut down System 6 because StuffIt Expander 4.0.1/4.0.2 was running in the background, you can fix it by opening StuffIt in ResEdit and changing the existing 'mstr' resource 100 to have an id of 103.

'mstr' resources tell MultiFinder which menu items to generate fake clicks for in order to quit or open another file from Finder when the application is already open in the background. StuffIt needs one because its File->Open menu item is named File->Expand... but Aladdin goofed and numbered it 100, which is supposed to be the name of the 'File' menu if it's not named 'File'. By changing it to 103, it lets MultiFinder know how to remotely open a file and also unbreaks its ability to select File->Quit at shutdown time.

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@WillFlux I was trying to figure out why opening a .sit from Finder launched StuffIt but StuffIt wouldn't do anything with it, so I thought maybe it needed an mstr for its "Extract..." menu.

I confirmed mstr doesn't have any effect on opening from the initial launch (the program itself needs to use CountAppFiles for this) so I wasn't able to fix that but noticed its existing mstr had the wrong id, which explains why quitting was broken. If they hadn't have added any mstr, quitting would have just worked out of the box.

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@FritzAdalis MultiFinder did, yeah. Kind of a hack but a clever way of making it just work in lots of existing programs that used standard File/Open/Quit naming without having to modify them.

swetland, to retrocomputing
@swetland@chaos.social avatar

Exploring software development on Classic 68K MacOS (late System 6 / early System 7) is wild.

I got THINK C 5.0.2 running in emulation, building some of the sample projects... and was wondering where exactly the intermediate files are going because I don't see anything on disk anywhere...

Turns out the compiler just stuffs all that in the project file itself, because I dunno, why not!

Finder on System 7 showing the THINK C "TinyEdit" sample code. The Project file, named TinyEdit.π for Reasons, is nearly 2MB, containing the object code for the sample and the app framework library it's using...

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@swetland Avoid the temptation to use it as a database though, it's not very resilient writing things back to disk (I know this from experience)

vga256, to random
@vga256@dialup.cafe avatar

fyi developers: if your app offers IAPs as "lifetime purchases", i am absolutely never going to pay for your software.

there is this persistent belief now, increasingly entrenched over the past few years, that a "lifetime" IAP subscription is equivalent to owning a piece of software.

no, no it's not. it's renting a piece of software for as long as your support lasts, or the storefront's support lasts.

i'm not saying anything new here, but i'm surprised at how commonplace this has become only in the past couple of years.

maybe Don't Be Adobe tattoos could come with every install of Xcode

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@vga256 What would you prefer it say?

jcs, (edited ) to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

A new version of my Wi-Fi Desk Accessory for BlueSCSI is out that fixes password entry on Mac OS 8+:

https://jcs.org/bluescsi

jcs, (edited ) to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

Slowly making my way through turning these 30 battery packs into PowerBook 140-180c batteries

https://www.tindie.com/products/jcs/powerbook-1xx-battery/

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@Random_Seed I didn't because I don't think I'd ever be able to get the color and texture correct so it would always look weird. I designed these so that the original sliding door attaches, though.

With the last batch I had a handful of doors collected from old machines available, but I sold out of all of them.

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@mmu_man Proper for what?

spike, to random

Hi @jcs - I'm using a BlueSCSI in a very old PowerBook, and I found your WiFi Desk Accessory download. Thanks for releasing that. According to my BlueSCSI log file and the DA, the laptop is connecting to the WiFi network preconfigured in the bluescsi.ini file, and things like the Lynx browser actually work!

However, I cannot figure out why, when I try to install the DaynaPORT software, it displays this weird error message during install.

I also can't figure out why (despite the browsers being able to load websites) the router that I am connecting to does not seem to show the Pi W MAC address (also configured in the bluescsi.ini file) in its admin interface's list of connected devices. Do you have any advice?

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@spike Hi, where did that DaynaPort software come from?

Are you using MacTCP with a static IP? If so, the router may not be listing it because the Mac never made a DHCP lease request.

@paulrickards This error looks like the same one you posted recently, was it also from a DaynaPort disk image?

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@paulrickards @spike Was it from the BlueSCSI Wiki/Website? Maybe the disk image @nulleric is offering is corrupted?

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@paulrickards @nulleric Yes, it has to install the ENET/ENET0 DRVR resources into the System file.

paulrickards, (edited ) to retrocomputing
@paulrickards@mastodon.social avatar

Was there ever a way to make the sizes of files not be truncated in System 6 list view?

Update: Yes, there was! See next post.

jcs,
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

@paulrickards Maybe something like this could be written to shorten values in the file size column
https://68kmla.org/bb/index.php?threads/today’s-the-day-critical-productivity-enhancement-for-finder-6-0-7-x.44062/

jcs, to random
@jcs@jcs.org avatar

Isn't this kind of a ridiculous number of expansion slots?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/296098141133

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